July 3 Morning Edition

SUBURBAN LIFE
— JULY 1, 2016 FLASHBACK: Wheaton Park District to host Independence Day festivities July 3 and 4 (DIERSEN: Be sure and stop by the DuPage County Republican booth at the fireworks. For the 11th consecutive year, DuPage Republicans will help sponsor the parade. This year, they are a $2,500 Gold Celebration Partner for the fireworks and parade. 22 DuPage Republicans have pledged $2,500: $250 from Chris Nybo; $150 from Liam Brennan, Dave Diersen, and Phil Suess; and $100 each from Bob Berlin, Peter Breen, Fred Bucholz, Mike Connelly, Tim Elliott, Amy Grant, Jeanne Ives, Richard Jorgensen, Chris Kachiroubas, Mark Kirk, Brian Krajewski, Bob Lyon, Deanne Mazzochi, James Mendrick, Peter Roskam, Darlene Ruscitti, Tim Whelan, and Jim Zay.)http://www.mysuburbanlife.com/2016/07/01/wheaton-park-district-to-host-independence-day-festivities/a1xbxv4/
(FROM THE ARTICLE: The annual Independence Day Celebration, featuring carnival rides, food vendors, a business expo, DJ, art mural, fireworks show and other activities, will be July 3 in Graf Park, 1701 Manchester Road. Guests are encouraged to bring lawn chairs, picnic blankets, snacks and nonalcoholic beverages. Due to district policy, no dogs will be allowed in the park apart from service animals. Parking will be available in the park just south of Monroe Middle School and also in the western fields of the fairgrounds. Sparklers and smoke bombs are prohibited. The celebration will continue the next morning with the Wheaton Park District and the city of Wheaton’s annual Fourth of July Parade, led by Grand Marshal Ed Ewoldt. The parade will step off at 10 a.m. from Hawthorne Boulevard and conclude at Cross and Front streets. To learn more and see a full schedule of events, visit www.wheatonparkdistrict.com/july4.)

CHICAGO TRIBUNE
— Taboos over talking politics at work loosen during divisive election season – Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz (DIERSEN: Democrats run America. Democrats Illinois. Democrats run Cook County. Democrats run Chicago. Democrats focus on getting rid of Republicans. If you are a Republican, if you have a job, sooner or later, Democrats will get rid of you. GAO hired me in 1980 because it could not find a qualified Democrat, minority, female, younger person, or veteran who would take the job. IRS hired me in 1971 because it could not find a qualified Democrat, minority, female, or veteran who would take the job. The Post Office hired me in 1966 because it could not find a qualified Democrat, minority, female, or veteran who would take the job.)http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-talking-politics-at-work-0703-biz-20160629-story.html— CHICAGO TRIBUNE ARTICLE TITLE: U.S. gun ownership drops to a 38-year low, study finds – Christopher Ingraham (DIERSEN: Could it be that because the Democrats want to abolish the Second Amendment, more and more and more falsely state that they do not own guns?)https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/06/29/american-gun-ownership-is-now-at-a-30-year-low/— Hard to reconcile Pope’s call for compassion with church doctrine on gays – Ted Slowik (DIERSEN: How soon will those individuals, organizations, companies, governments, and countries that promote LGBTQ activity succeed in getting the Pope a) to promote LGBTQ activity and b) to demonize, denigrate, and condemn those who do not promote LGBTQ activity?)http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/daily-southtown/opinion/ct-sta-slowik-pope-st-0629-20160628-story.html— FRONT PAGE TOP OF FOLD OF NAPERVILLE SUN: Little-known registry lists murderers in your town, but is it a good thing? – Bill Bird , Hannah Leone and Gloria Casas (DIERSEN: What do you say to individuals, organizations, companies, governments, countries, etc. that encourage criminals to move into and to stay in a) your precinct, b) your municipality, c) your township/ward, d) your county, e) Illinois, and f) America? Of course, needless-to-say, those who bring in criminals are responsible for what those criminals do.)http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/naperville-sun/crime/ct-nvs-illinois-murderer-registry-st-0626-20160701-story.html

WORLD NET DAILY
— DHS PLAN TO BAN ‘OFFENSIVE’ TERMS WON’T STOP TERRORISM ‘They have already declared war on us multiple times’- PAUL BREMMER (DIERSEN: Those who are anti-Protestant, anti-conservative, anti-Republican, anti-American, anti-White, anti-male, anti-older people, anti-rich people, anti-gun owners, and/or anti-those whose ancestors have been in America longer than their ancestors SIDE WITH TERRORISTS AGAINST THOSE WHO ARE Protestant, conservative, Republican, American, White, male, older, rich, gun owners, and/or those whose ancestors have been in America longer than their ancestors.)http://www.wnd.com/2016/06/dhs-plan-to-ban-offensive-terms-wont-stop-terrorism/#!

CHRISTIAN TODAY
— How to shut down gossip – Patrick Mabilog (DIERSEN: Democrats run America. Democrats run Illinois. Democrats run Cook County. Democrats run Chicago. Sooner or later, if not already, Democrats will say that you are a racist, a bigot, a hater, and even worse things if you do not promote Democrats. How have those who do not promote Democrats reacted to that? How are those who do not promote Democrats reacting to that? How will those who do not promote Democrats react to that? Will those who do not promote Democrats a) go to court and get restraining orders against Democrats, b) file lawsuits against Democrats charging them with slander, or c) take stronger actions? From what I see, ever-increasingly, if a Democrat says that you are a racist, a bigot, a hater, or worse things, a) you will be fired if you have a job, b) you will not be able to get a job, and c) even worse things will happen to you.)http://www.christiantoday.com/article/how.to.shut.down.gossip/89620.htm

FRONT PAGE MAGAZINE
— THE WORST SMEAR SITE IN AMERICA The Southern Poverty Law Center smears patriots and provides cover for the nation’s enemies. – Matthew Vadumhttp://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/263332/worst-smear-site-america-matthew-vadum
(FROM THE ARTICLE: The far-left Southern Poverty Law Center relentlessly promotes the Big Lie, wildly popular in the media, that conservative Americans are racists and the real threat to the nation rather than Islamic terrorists. The group claims the principal enemies of the American people are presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, conservatives like David Horowitz, and the Tea Party movement. The SPLC is a shamelessly hypocritical leftist attack machine funded by radical speculator George Soros and a rogue’s gallery of rich people and established philanthropies that want to fundamentally transform America. The fabulously wealthy 501(c)(3) nonprofit has an astounding one third of a billion dollars ($338 million) in assets, as well as investments in Bermuda and the Cayman Islands, two offshore tax havens the Left loves to attack (but only when non-leftists stash cash there). The Center characterizes all opposition to immigration and open borders as symptomatic of hate and all political expression of those views to be hate speech. In other words, if you disagree with founder Morris Dees and his minions you are evil and worthy of public condemnation. It may take some intellectual toughness to insist that the nation has the right to decide who may or may not cross its borders, but it’s not hate. Following the Islamist massacre at a gay club in Orlando a fortnight ago, the group has played an integral role in the Left’s propaganda push aimed at taking the focus away from gay-hating Islam and finding creative ways to blame conservatives and Republicans for the slaughter. Two days after Orlando as a sea of rainbow flags rivaling those that washed over Facebook and Twitter following the Supreme Court’s pro-same sex marriage ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges swept over social media, David Dinielli, deputy legal director of SPLC’s LGBT Rights Project, tossed out a red herring as he whined amidst a national outpouring of grief that somehow politicians weren’t doing enough to characterize the attack as an assault on the gay community. Instead of blaming Muslim terrorist Omar Mateen, reportedly a registered Democrat, for the attack, Dinielli blamed people like Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) instead. Many politicians were secretly delighted so many gays were killed, he implied. “[M]any who offered their ‘thoughts and prayers’ know exactly what they are doing. They are trading on political expediency. The demonization of gay, lesbian, and transgender Americans pays, politically.” But this “demonization” of the LGBT community that the Southern Poverty Law Center complains of is pure paranoid fantasy. Anyone who followed media coverage in the days following the June 12 incident knows that cable TV and other media were filled with wall-to-wall denunciations of the Muslim terrorist Omar Mateen by politicians who acknowledged the sexual orientation of the victims whether explicitly or implicitly. Even those not generally sympathetic to gay rights made it clear that murder, including the murder of people based on their sexual preference, was morally abhorrent. None of this is surprising to those of us who have been tracking the SPLC’s adventures in vilification and defamation over the years. The SPLC is waging a scorched-earth war against Donald Trump. The group routinely and baselessly associates Trump with neo-Nazis, white nationalists, and other marginal political actors it calls “the racist right.” Pointing out that these fringe figures back Trump in the election is the most obvious kind of smear. The Left did the same thing to Ronald Reagan in 1984 when the Ku Klux Klan offered him its unwanted endorsement. Reagan waited a full two weeks to denounce the KKK and reject its endorsement. But Trump waited barely a day after a bungled CNN interview Feb. 28 in which Jake Tapper asked him if he would reject the Klan’s endorsement of him. Trump gave a less than clear answer to Tapper, blaming a “bad earpiece” that led him to misunderstand the question. The very next day Trump asked “How many times do I have to continue to disavow people?” and attacked the KKK on Michael Savage’s radio show. Replying to a question, he said “yeah, totally denounce, and I disavowed it, and I’ve disavowed it numerous times, and I’ve disavowed it on Twitter and on Facebook and all over the place but people refuse to accept it.” The SPLC’s annual report on “hate” in America this year features a cover picture of Trump, a man the group blames for increasing hate in the U.S. According to the left-wing Guardian (UK), “the image underscores a theme laid out by the report’s author, about how hate speech has invaded mainstream political discourse in a way that might have shocked many even a year ago.” “I have been writing these Year in Hate and Extremism essays for 20 years now, and only very rarely, if at all, have we seen a year like last year,” said SPLC senior fellow Mark Potok. Hate, of course, isn’t exactly a precise concept in the world of politics and ideology, and the SPLC likes it that way because then it has wide latitude to malign and slander its targets. Its leaders are no doubt proud that Pentagon training materials borrow from SPLC reports and refer to extremists as “haters,” a colloquialism that appears in hip hop music and in humorous graphic art posted on the Internet. Trump is definitely a hater, according to the Center. On April 4 its blog cited his “continued embrace of racist and extremist ideas” and accused him of turning “the political landscape on its side and introduced countless numbers to hate speech and racist conspiracy theories.” It’s all spin and lies. The SPLC is still bellyaching over the courageous, electrifying anti-illegal immigration speech Trump gave last summer when launching his campaign. In it Trump said many of the Mexicans crossing illegally into the U.S. are “people that have lots of problems” who bring drugs and crime with them and that some are “rapists.” Trump’s statements are demonstrably true. He wasn’t saying all Mexicans are criminals, just many of the Mexicans sneaking into the country. This isn’t racism: it is empirical fact. Many of the so-called hate groups the SPLC monitors are so labeled because they fail to genuflect before political correctness. The Center labels as hate groups respectable right-leaning organizations such as the Center for Security Policy (CSP), Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), American Freedom Defense Initiative, and the David Horowitz Freedom Center, which publishes FrontPage. The Southern Poverty Law Center frequently targets New York-based civil rights attorney David Yerushalmi, a co-founder of the American Freedom Law Center and counsel to CSP. In 2011 the SPLC named Yerushalmi to its 10-member “Anti-Muslim Inner Circle.” Among the other “members” of the inner circle are David Horowitz, Robert Spencer, Pamela Geller, and Brigitte Gabriel. According to the Center, the rhetoric these individuals use “reveals how doggedly this group works to provoke and guide populist anger over what is seen as the threat posed by the 0.6% of Americans who are Muslim — an agenda that goes beyond reasonable concern about terrorism into the realm of demonization.” The Guardian ran a story last week attacking Yerushalmi for daring to countersue a group of grandstanding Muslim women trying to shake down a Laguna Beach, Calif. café. The women filed a discrimination lawsuit claiming they were given the bum’s rush at the establishment because they were wearing hijabs. The café counters that the women violated the 45-minute seating time limit and that other headscarf-clad women present were not asked to leave. The newspaper regurgitated SPLC writings on Yerushalmi who maintains that the women’s lawyers are “ambulance-chasers” involved in “an extortion.” It reported: “Asked about the SPLC’s characterization of him, Yerushalmi said that he ‘represents a lot of Muslims.’ “I represent Muslim Americans, running from jihad and seeking asylum. If you want to say I’m an anti-jihad lawyer, you’re 100% right,” he continued. “Am I anti-Sharia? Yes, I am. Am I anti-Muslim? Not if he doesn’t have a gun in his hand shooting at me.’ “Yerushalmi alleged that the suit against Urth Caffe was part of a wider “civilizational jihad” waged by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) which aims, he said, “to weaken western civilization.” The SPLC never tires of trying to assassinate the character of David Horowitz. A May 24, 2014 profile calls him “the godfather of the modern anti-Muslim movement.” Without presenting a shred of useful evidence, the Center separately smears Horowitz as “a driving force of the anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant and anti-black movements.” Horowitz rejects these characterizations. On Monday he told this writer: “I’m called the godfather of the anti-Muslim movement, which puts a target on my back, whereas out of million words and scores of hours of speeches on the subject they couldn’t find one sentence to back up their claim.” The Southern Poverty Law Center has been playing this dangerous game for a long time. It doesn’t care if it gets innocent Americans killed. It came close to getting people killed four years ago. SPLC reports inspired left-wing terrorist Floyd Lee Corkins II to shoot up the Washington, D.C. headquarters of the Family Research Council four years ago. The Center identified FRC as a “hate group” not because it actually hates anyone but because it opposes same-sex marriage. Even the reliably left-wing Dana Milbank rejected that designation for FRC in an Aug. 16, 2012 Washington Post column, calling that group “a mainstream conservative think tank.” “I disagree with the Family Research Council’s views on gays and lesbians,” he wrote. “But it’s absurd to put the group, as the law center does, in the same category as Aryan Nations, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Stormfront and the Westboro Baptist Church.” Corkins apparently disagreed. Upon entering FRC’s office he reportedly said “I don’t like your politics” and shot a black Christian security guard who managed to subdue him and lived to forgive him. Later Corkins told investigators “Southern Poverty Law lists anti-gay groups,” the Washington Examiner reported at the time. “I found them online, did a little research, went to the website, stuff like that.” The gay rights-avenging shooter had planned to kill as many FRC staffers as possible and smear Chick-fil-A sandwiches — his backpack contained 15 of them — on their faces as a political statement. He chose that fast food chain whose management is unabashedly Christian because its president was revealed to be a supporter of traditional marriage. Corkins was convicted of terrorism in 2013 and sentenced to 25 years in prison. And when the next Floyd Corkins comes along and actually succeeds in killing someone targeted by the Southern Poverty Law Center, its staffers will direct blame elsewhere. Scapegoating is what they do best.)

TOWNHALL
— Federal Government Out of Control Again – Bruce Bialosky (DIERSEN: Constructively, since 1997, the Democrats who run GAO have had me on administrative leave. Constructively, since 1997, the Democrats who run GAO have forced the Civil Service Retirement System to pay me $50,712 a year to stay home and to not come to work at GAO. What do Bialosky, Von Ah, and you have to say about that?)http://townhall.com/columnists/brucebialosky/2016/07/03/federal-government-out-of-control-again-n2185920
(FROM THE ARTICLE: Our federal government suffers from lack of focus trying to do too many things while doing too many poorly. This behemoth allows for huge waste that gets buried in the apathy bred by the very definition of what happens when you are spending OPM (other people’s money). The GAO (Government Accountability Office) recently released a report about administrative leave in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that boggles the mind. Though the Washington Post covered the story, my inner soul told me as staggering as their report was they still were probably doing an inadequate job. Thus, I dug in to find the real story of how our money is being abused. The report was written by a team lead by Andrew Von Ah, the acting director of Homeland Security and Justice at the GAO. Mr. Von Ah was surprisingly responsive for a federal government employee. We connected a couple of times allowing me to address some of my insights from the 34-page report. The report focused only on administrative leave for the DHS. Administrative leave is defined as any paid leave that is not sick leave or vacation leave. What alarmed people was that, over the five years of the study (from 2011-2015), 116 DHS employees were on administrative leave for more than a year costing us over $19.8 million. From all appearances the agency did not have discernible consistent controls over how people were put on admin leave nor how long they stayed on leave.)

DENVER SPRINGS GAZETTE
— That ‘racist’ Summit in Denver – Editorial (DIERSEN: Democrats run America. Democrats run Illinois. Democrats run Cook County. Democrats run Chicago. Sooner or later, if not already, Democrats will say that you are a racist, a bigot, a hater, and even worse things if you do not promote Democrats. How have those who do not promote Democrats reacted to that? How are those who do not promote Democrats reacting to that? How will those who do not promote Democrats react to that? Will those who do not promote Democrats a) go to court and get restraining orders against Democrats, b) file lawsuits against Democrats charging them with slander, or c) take stronger actions? From what I see, ever-increasingly, if a Democrat says that you are a racist, a bigot, a hater, or worse things, a) you will be fired if you have a job, b) you will not be able to get a job, and c) even worse things will happen to you.)http://gazette.com/editorial-that-racist-summit-in-denver/article/1579534
(FROM THE EDITORIAL: White male protesters stood outside the Colorado Convention Center during the Western Conservative Summit, protesting a “racist” event going on inside. Shouting through bullhorns and waving obscene signs, with fists in the air, the protests occasionally turned violent as police formed a wall between the mob and Summit attendees Friday night. Protesters, mostly motivated by the presence of presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, conveyed a central theme: Conservatives are old, white, racist men of privilege. Signs said “Down with This Sort of Thing,” “America was Never Great” and “Purge White Supremacy.” Inside, an audience of thousands anxiously awaited Saturday night’s speech by Colorado’s Republican nominee for the United States Senate. He is Darryl Glenn, a black man who grew up in Colorado Springs, worked his way through the United States Air Force Academy, completed a military intelligence career, worked to support his family while finishing law school and won four local elections by landslides. Glenn symbolizes the possibilities afforded in a free society that defends equal opportunity. Because Glenn is black and conservative, much of the mainstream media wrote him off before the primary. After his nomination, journalist-pundit types effectively called the race for incumbent Sen. Michael Bennet a full seven months before a vote would be cast. At the “racist” Summit, attendees anticipated improving the Senate’s diversity by helping Glenn upset Bennet — a white man brought up in a prominent political family in Washington, D.C. While waiting for Glenn, the audience applauded a lineup of speakers considerably more diverse than the white-male protesters outside. A small sample includes: Kristina Arriaga, a young Hispanic female who serves as executive director of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. A lawyer who grew up in poverty, after her parents escaped Cuba, Arriaga has won several Supreme Court victories and defended the religious practices of American Indians and a variety of other religious minorities. Star Parker, a young black woman who grew up in rough neighborhoods of East St. Louis, Ill. After working her way through college, Parker established the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, based in Washington, D.C., to improve school options for minority children. Linda Chavez, a Hispanic woman who heads the Center for Equal Opportunity. State Rep. Clarice Navarro, a young Hispanic Republican from Pueblo. Vera Ortegon, a Hispanic woman elected by Colorado Republicans as their National Committeewoman for 2016. George Leing, an Asian-American man elected by Colorado Republicans as their National Committeeman for 2016 Casper Stockham, a black man nominated by Republicans to run for Congress in Colorado’s 1st Congressional District. An exhaustive list of young, female, religiously diverse minority scholars and politicos leading the Summit would be too long for inclusion here. We’ll suffice to say white men were scarce. They were a minority among conference speakers, but an overwhelming majority among those charging “racism.” Like other blacks and minorities leading the conference, Glenn said the “old-white-male” stereotype used against Republicans is bizarre. “I am proud to be part of the Republican Party, which elevates people on a basis of merit and not on a basis of race,” Glenn told The Gazette before his speech. “As a meritocracy, we are the young party of diversity. The protesters support a party of mostly old white people telling younger minorities they can’t survive without more government.”)

THE GUARDIAN
— Let’s make retirement great again – by bringing back a pension system As Americans look to build their future on 401k plans, they find themselves perched atop nest eggs that are far too small – Suzanne McGee (DIERSEN: In 1966, when I was 18 years old, when I started working part-time for the Park Forest Post Office, I began saving for my retirement by earning both Civil Service Retirement System and Social Security credits. Of course, needless-to-say, my critics/opponents in Wheaton, in Glen Ellyn, in Milton Township, and in DuPage County, and especially those who have financial problems, hate me for that. My critics/opponents a) were never qualified for and/or b) considered themselves to be “too good” for the jobs that I had a) doing yard work, b) delivering newspapers, c) washing dishes, d) cleaning golf shoes, e) chipping slag, f) pumping gasoline, g) delivering mail, h) working on an automobile assembly line, i) working as a security guard, j) selling tires, automotive services, and major appliances, k) collecting delinquent taxes, and l) auditing federal agencies. What do you say to my critics/opponents?)https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/jul/03/retirement-pensions-money
(FROM THE ARTICLE: Here’s a thought about how to make America great again: bring back pensions. If Donald Trump really is intent on turning back the clock to the glory days of an America before globalization knocked the stuffing out of the US manufacturing sector, why stop at trade? Part of what is making all but the wealthiest Americans feel so economically vulnerable today isn’t just that incomes have been eviscerated. It’s the fact that when we retire, those of us without pensions – a growing proportion, especially if we’re not public sector employees or union employees – are perched atop very, very tiny nest eggs. Last year’s report from the nonpartisan US government accountability office (GAO) reminded us of the perils. Half of all households headed by Americans 55 and older had no retirement savings at all. While some long-term savers may have retirement accounts with as much as $251,600, Fidelity reported that the average amount in a 401k – the replacements to pensions that companies began rolling out during the 1980s – was little more than a third of that amount.)

LGBTQ NATION
— Orlando’s gay commissioner Patty Sheehan: GOP ‘loaded those bullets with hatred’ – Charline Jao (DIERSEN: How soon, if not already, will Sheehan call for Republicans to be killed? Republicans are buying more and more and more firearms and ammunition for their self-defense. Of course, needless-to-say, my critics/opponents side with Sheehan. My critics/opponents blame me for the problems that those who engage in LGBTQ activity have had, are having, and will have.)http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2016/06/orlandos-gay-commissioner-gop-loaded-bullets-hatred/

Author: David Diersen

The opinions that I express in GOPUSA ILLINOIS emails are based on experience that I have gained doing many things since 1948. I base my opinions on what I learned a) working for the federal government for almost 30 years -- Post Office 1966-1969, IRS 1971-1980, and GAO 1980-1997, serving on the Executive Committee of the Association of Government Accountants Chicago Chapter 1983-1996, and being a union member while I worked for the Post Office and IRS; b) earning an MBA from Loyola in 1976, a masters degree in accounting from DePaul in 1980, and a masters degree in financial markets and trading from IIT in 1997; c) passing the CPA examination on my first attempt in 1979 and passing the Certified Internal Auditor examination on my first attempt in 1981; c) serving as a Republican Precinct Committeeman since 1999, the GOPUSA Illinois Editor since 2000, the TAPROOT Republicans of Illinois Chairman 2005-2012, a member of the 2008 Illinois Republican Party (IRP) Platform and Resolutions Committee, a Wheaton Chamber of Commerce Government Affairs Committee member 2003-2011, the Milton Township Republican Central Committee webmaster 2008-2010 and 2000-2004, an Illinois Center Right Coalition Steering Committee member 2003-2007, and an American Association of Political Consultants Midwest Chapter board member 2001-2004; d) attending the 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, and 2016 IRP State Conventions as a delegate; e) being the subject of a nasty 4-page article in the February 1978 issue of Money Magazine; f) pursing litigation including Diersen v. GAO and Diersen v. Chicago Car Exchange; g) being married since 1978; h) living in Crete 1948-1972, in University Park 1972-1976, in Chicago 1976-1978, and in DuPage County, Milton Township, and Wheaton since 1978; and i) being baptized, raised, and confirmed as a Missouri Synod Lutheran.
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